"Imagine a modern-day retelling of Mark Twain's classic The Adventures
of Huckleberry Finn, with a teenage girl and a very pregnant young
Mexican as the main characters. That's the gist of Matthew Olshan's
brilliant literary debut, Finn: A Novel.The book's narrator is Chloe
Wilder, a quiet girl, part tomboy, part survivor. Rescued from a
murderous life with her mother, Chloe lives with her grandparents in the
cocoon of a quiet, middle-class neighborhood. For the first time in her
life, things are steady, safe--and stifling.Enter Silvia Morales, the
grandparents' maid. Silvia is an illegal immigrant, but that's not her
only secret: She's also pregnant, a transgression which gets her kicked
out of the house. Not long after, Chloe is torn from her quiet life,
too, and forced to live on the run.While Finn is about Chloe and
Silvia's comic mishaps--and their brushes with real danger--on the road,
it's also a dark portrait of modern America, where smug suburbanites
live minutes away from the wilderness of inner cities, and once-mighty
rivers meander under superhighways.Finn has been approved for
ninth-grade English use statewide by the South Carolina Department of
Education (2004). It's required for all high school college prep
freshmen (2009).It was named one of LA's Best 100 Books for 2001 by the
Los Angeles Unified School District.Finn was a finalist for the Michal
L. Printz Award and the Booklist Editor's Choice Award, and it was
considered for the PEN/Faulkner. It was nominated for YALSA Quick Picks
(for reluctant teen readers) and for ""Best Book of 2001) by
Bookreporter.com.It was selected ""Best Children's Book of 2001) by
Plymouth Library, Plymouth, MI, and voted ""Book of the Month"" by Lake
Mills, Wisconsin Library (2002).It was placed on the 2002 Summer Reading
List for Lovett School in Atlanta, GA, and also on the Summer Reading
List at Westside High School in Mason, GA."